The
Web offers a wide variety of opportunities to discuss science/faith questions.
For practical reasons most discussions are unmoderated. The result is
often less than ideal. The loss of focus, dominance by a few vocal participants,
contributions by those with dubious qualifications, a flood of material,
repetition of points by latecomers to the discussion, fiery rhetoric, and
uncertain termination points; the reader is left to sort out the wheat from the
chaff.

Moderated
discussions offer many advantages. An effective moderator can keep the debate
focused and insure quality of discussion, independence, breath of view, broad
intellectual appeal, brevity, and closure. One recently inaugurated series, Nature
debates, sponsored by the British journal, Nature, illustrates this
strategy. Beginning 19 November and running through 24 December 1998, Moderator
Andrew Smith (Natural History Museum, London) led a discussion on the question,
"Is the fossil record adequate?" Smith's two-page introduction laid
out the pros and cons on the question and provided basic references. Three
differing points of view of similar length followed. Succeeding weeks saw
exchanges by an international set of experts and representative e-mail
contributions from the audience. Smith concluded the discussion by drawing
together the main ideas that had emerged during the six weeks. Publication on
the Nature web site: http:// helix.nature.com/debates/index.html allowed
both timely discussion and a permanent record.

Moderated
discussion on the ASA web site offers many opportunities for an organization
committed to freely discussing questions on which there is disagreement. The
editor would be open to proposals for exchanges on the ASA site.